The Alternative

Dr. Tony Evans: You either progress or you regress, there’s no such thing as static Christianity.

Host (Male): Dr. Tony Evans says your own spiritual growth includes helping others grow, too.

Dr. Tony Evans: Your Christianity is real when you see another brother who is straying from the truth, who you care about enough to seek to turn them around.

Host (Male): This is *The Alternative* broadcast, featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans.

We pay attention when people walk through the front doors of the church, but what about the ones who quietly walk out the back? Today, Dr. Evans reminds us that our responsibility doesn't end when someone drifts away from the faith. Let’s turn to James chapter five as he talks about the importance of reaching out and restoring our brothers and sisters in the Lord.

Dr. Tony Evans: God is a good parent. And as a parent, he is vitally concerned about the road that his children take. And God knows that in the midst of suffering, trials, difficulty, and danger, that sometimes his sheep stray. Rather than hanging tough, being patient, they decide to throw in the towel, to quit. He says four things in these two verses that I would like to look at today.

First of all, he wants to talk about the reality of backsliding. "My brethren, if any among you strays from the truth." Please notice the phrase "among you." Among the family of the redeemed. And the "among you" is tied to the brethren, so the brethren are the saints. He says if one among the congregation of the saints strays. That Greek word "strays" is from the word we get our word "planet" from.

If a planet, if one of the celestial bodies leaves its course, strays. No longer is in line with the sun, but orbits out. If it no longer maintains its position, strays. And he's among you. He's been attending your services, perhaps singing in your choir or involved in one of your ministries or on your staff or whatever it happens to be, and he makes or she makes a left turn in life.

That’s the scenario. Or to more formally define a backslider, or we would call them a carnal Christian, it is a spiritual state where a Christian knowingly and persistently lives to please and serve self rather than Christ. To put it another way, a backslider is a person who is no longer progressing in the faith. Now, let me explain how the faith works.

You either progress or you regress. There’s no such thing as static Christianity. You cannot be neutral as a Christian. You can move forward, you can move backward, but you can never stay still because when you’re standing still, you’re automatically drifting back. So stillness means regression. Sort of like riding a bicycle. You can pedal it back or you can pedal it forward, but staying still—that's not how it's designed to go. You're either going in one direction or not.

This text here is about believers who are backsliding, so we're assuming that at some point they front-slid. Some people think they’re backsliders and have never front-slid. They’ve never become Christians. They say, "Oh, I'm a backslider," and they’ve never been saved. A backslider is a saved person sliding back, not a non-Christian doing wrong. You need to front-slide before you can back-slide.

If you're here today and you're not a Christian, your issue is a relationship with Jesus Christ, not an issue of straying. You were born strayed from the truth. So he raises this issue about the backslider, about the Christian who regresses and who needs to be turned around. The Bible has evidences of this, of Christians who stray from the truth. Peter is probably one of the most noted ones because he said, "Lord, I’ll never stray." And never say never.

I’ll never stray from the truth because I love you more than these. I’m your main man, and if all the rest of your disciples leave you, you can count on me. I’m your main man. And Jesus said to Peter, "Before the cock crows, before tomorrow morning, you will have denied me three times."

I would have thought Peter, just hearing that, would have just doubled himself up and said, "If I mess up, it won’t be before that cock crows because I just heard you tell me that, so I'm going to make sure that I don't do that." Well, before the cock crowed, he had already cussed Jesus' name before the ungodly.

But it was a very interesting statement Jesus made to Peter in Luke 22 verse 32. He says, "And when you are converted, strengthen your brethren." You're going to mess up, but after you get fixed up, the next time you run into somebody else who messes up, remember what I did for you. One of the ministries of the local church is to identify the reality of the straying believer.

The process of straying is very interesting because there is a very definitive road that the strayer takes. Hold your finger here and turn back a few pages to the book of Hebrews, and let's just look at a couple of key verses that show us the path of straying. Hebrews chapter two, first of all, verses two and three. "For if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense, how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation?"

The first way you know you're straying is spiritual neglect. You're not doing anything real bad; it's just that you're not doing anything real good either. It's that you're just neglecting this great salvation that God has given you and you're just taking it for granted. Any of you wives here today feel neglected? The husband may argue, "Well, I go to work, I bring my money home," but that is really not hitting the point. They may be doing the basics, but they're still neglecting the relationship. Spiritual neglect is the first step to straying.

Then Hebrews chapter three, verses 12 and 13. "Take care, brethren, lest there should be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart in falling away from the living God. But encourage one another day after day, for as long as it is still called today, lest any one of you should be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin." First of all, there is neglect, and then there is spiritual insensitivity. In other words, sin is not as sinful as it used to be.

All of us know that when you first sin, you feel real, real, real, real bad. After a few more times, you feel kind of bad. After a few more times, this isn't right. After a few more times, well, everybody else is doing it. After a few more times, I really don't feel that bad about it. That is because callouses have set in on the heart.

And when callouses set in on the heart, you get hardened by sin's ability to dupe you so that sin is not anymore exceedingly sinful. It's kind of not all that bad. So he raises the possibility that you move from spiritual neglect to spiritual insensitivity. Thirdly, chapter five of the book of Hebrews, verse 11 and following. He talks about the fact that concerning him, "we have much to explain, but you have become dull of hearing."

The word "dull of hearing," the word "dull" referred to the mind of a mule. To be dull meant to be mule-headed. We talk about the stubbornness of a mule. Well, that's the context here because he says in verse 12, "For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of God." You've made no progress. Why? Because there has been a refusal to grow over time.

So you start with neglect, then you become insensitive, and then you don't even care. You refuse to grow. I don care about growing. I'm not going to grow, and that's not my interest. So the deceitfulness of sin has made you lose all interest in spiritual growth.

Host (Male): Dr. Evans has more to share on the preservation of backsliders when he continues in just a moment. Don't go away.

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Host (Male): You can learn more and access the Tony Evans Training Center directly at tonyevanstraining.org. Now, before we get back to today's lesson, I want to let you know that today is your last chance to take advantage of a resource package we put together to help you dig deeper into Dr. Evans' study of the book of James.

The package begins with Tony's 16-message, two-volume sermon series called *James: Time to Grow Up*, a collection of lessons that take the practical truths from this book and show us what genuine spiritual maturity looks like in everyday life. Along with the audio series, we'll also send you Dr. Evans' 30-day devotional book, *Trusting God in Turbulent Times*.

These resources offer biblical teaching and daily encouragement to help strengthen your trust in God as he sees you through both good times and bad. We'd like to send you this unique package as our thank-you gift when you make a contribution to support *The Alternative*. But today is the final day we'll be offering these together, so visit tonyevans.org right away. All the details are right on the homepage. Or give us a call at 1-800-800-3222 where a friendly team member is ready to help with your request. That's tonyevans.org or by phone at 1-800-800-3222.

Well, let's get back to Dr. Evans now as he references a passage in the book of Hebrews.

Dr. Tony Evans: Finally, that leads to flagrant rebellion. Look at chapter 10, verse 26. "For if we go on sinning"—so this one's just sinning up a storm—"willfully"—I'm going to sin, I know I'm sinning, I want to sin, and you don't tell me what to do—"after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains sacrifice for sin." Or the blood of Jesus Christ won't protect you any longer.

"But a certain terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversary." What is he saying? He is saying the anger that God has toward the non-believer he will even take out on his own kids when they adopt trampling the blood of Christ. This is a willful, I don't care attitude. That is the process of the backslider who is straying from the truth.

Given the fact that backsliding is real—it is a real possibility that you won't be where you are today next year this time. Any of us in this room might stray. That leads to the second point: the responsibility to backsliders in James. He says, "And one turns him back. Let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his ways..."

Here we're introduced to the responsibility of one believer to another believer to turn him around. This is the thing that we don't like. This is the thing that we don't practice, and some of us here today aid and abet the demise of our brothers and sisters because we said, "That's none of my business." We were just told that Elijah prayed. And when he prayed, a situation was reversed.

It was dry and there was no rain, but when he prayed, there was the rain from heaven and blessing came where a curse had been. It is the responsibility of one believer to another believer to take them from this wayward path like a sheep and turn them into blessing rather than to allow them to continue in a circumstance of cursing.

Now, what he is saying is Paul wants to move his readers from a state of grumbling because they were complaining to a state of action. He wants to get them to stop just sitting, soaking in sorrow, and start getting in the business of turning backsliders around. To move from self-centeredness to other-centeredness. Isn't that what he said in verse 16? Pray for one another. Confess your faults to one another.

What he's trying to get us to do is be vitally involved in the life of one another. And that's when the church is being the church. That's when your Christianity is real. Your Christianity is real when you see another brother who is straying from the truth, who you care about enough to seek to turn them around. This means that you cannot be a passive Christian. This means you cannot just sit back and do nothing.

God told Adam and Eve when they were in the garden, "The day that you sin, you shall surely die." But the day that they sinned, they didn't drop dead of a heart attack. They didn't—well, yes they did. Because the day that Adam and Eve sinned, they broke fellowship with God. But now let me tell you what the loss of it did. When they lost fellowship with God, before they entered the ground in the grave, guess what happened? Their whole world deteriorated.

Their whole lives fell apart. They had one son kill another son. He had to work with thorns and thistles. There was a big fight, and there would be a big tension between husbands and wives. You know why all that happened? Because they had entered the realm of spiritual death. Spiritual death means that you no longer had the intimate presence of God operating in your life and circumstances, so there is a deterioration of your world.

And some of us are going through spiritual death. So you save a person from a deteriorating life when you go after them because when God removes his hands from you, that means there's no longer divine protection. There's no longer divine well-being. And yes, in his grace he might not give you everything that you deserve, but life still is hitting the skids because you strayed from the truth. And one of the great tragedies today is people trying to do everything to fix problems when they haven't fixed it spiritually first.

Finally, he talks about the renewal of the backslider. You will save a soul from death, and here is a wonderful phrase: and will cover a multitude of sins. And will cover a multitude of sins. This is a quote from the book of Proverbs chapter 10, verse 12, where it says that hate produces strife, but love covers a multitude of sins.

Now, the badge of Christianity is love. "By this shall all men know you're my disciples, that you love one another"—John 13. Biblical love is measured by the sacrifice you're willing to make for the benefit of somebody else. "For God demonstrated his love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." Love is tied to sacrifice. How much did Christ love us? He loved us to death.

When the sacrifice of love is done, something happens. You'll always know whether you're loving because of how you handle the believer's sin that got him to stray. Now, watch this. When you are used of God to cover a brother's sin, God will show you grace in covering yours. I will show mercy to he who shows mercy, but to him who shows no mercy, he will receive no mercy.

If you don't relate to another brother in mercy—again, not excusing their sin, not ignoring their sin, but not providing any unnecessary exposure to the sin beyond that which needs to know about it—you cover it. You don't embellish it, endorse it, spread it, and that kind of line. Then you become a candidate for mercy in your time of need.

But if you don't handle it right, your business's going to be all over the place. Know that now because God will make sure that. Now, please notice the standard in closing. The standard is truth, not your personal opinion. I'm talking about what God says, not what you think. There are a billion different preferences. What God is trying to talk about is the person who strays from the truth. That is, the fixed standard of reality in God's Word, not because they're not doing things like you want them.

We want to spend time changing people's preferences when we ought to focus on dealing with the truth, that which is a standard because that is love. A husband and wife one day were fussing. They were going at it. They were after each other. Back and forth, back and forth. So the wife said, "Well, why don't we write down our complaints on a piece of paper and show the other person exactly how we feel?"

Husband said, "Okay, get the paper." She got the paper, he got the paper, they both had a pencil, and they started writing. And then he looked up at her and started writing some more. And she looked up at him and started writing some more. And he looked up at her even angrier and wrote more. She was finished, he's still writing. And he's writing some more and he's writing some more and he's writing some more.

And she's getting furious over there because she's finished one side of the paper. He's finishing the second side of the paper, writing some more. Every time he looked up, something new would come and he'd write some more. And it was just—she was just in pain and agony. She was just clenching her fist, and tears of anger were swelling up in her eyes. And he says, he says, "I'm finished."

She said, "Well, let's change sheets." He gave her his sheet, she gave him her sheet, and they looked at each other's sheet. As soon as she gave him her sheet, she says, "Give me my sheet back now." And the reason she said it is because when she looked at his sheet, in spite of his anger, in spite of his pain, he had written on every line, "I love you."

"I love you. I love you. I'm ticked off, but I love you. I'm angry, but I love you. Don't want to be here right now, but I love you." And when she saw that much love, it covered the multitude of sins that had brought up the argument in the first place. When you and I love one another like that—yes, it's painful, but I love you. Yes, you've done me wrong, but I love you. Yes, you're going the wrong way, but I love you.

When you get that much love in the house, it'll cover a multitude of sins. May God make us a congregation that goes after folks who are straying because we love them. And better yet, God loves them more.

Host (Male): Dr. Tony Evans on the importance of lovingly correcting and restoring believers who have fallen from the faith. Now, what you've been hearing today is the final message in Tony's 16-part, two-volume teaching series called *James: Time to Grow Up*.

As I mentioned earlier, today is the last day to request the complete audio collection, which includes material we didn't have time to share on the air, along with Dr. Evans' 30-day devotional, *Trusting God in Turbulent Times*. Together, these resources provide practical biblical teaching and daily encouragement to help you grow in your faith, deepen your trust in God, and remain anchored in his truth through life's toughest seasons.

This special package is available as our thank-you gift when you make a contribution to support the ministry. Contact us today before time runs out on this special offer. Visit tonyevans.org or give us a call at 1-800-800-3222 and let one of our friendly team members help you. Our resource center is open 24 hours a day, so call when you can today. That's 1-800-800-3222.

The Bible has been called a book of wisdom, a life manual, even a philosophical guide. But Dr. Evans says it's much more than that. On Monday, he explains why scripture is completely unique, unlike any other book in history, because it doesn't just contain words about God, it is the Word of God. Be sure to tune in as Tony begins a fascinating exploration of the glory of God's Word.